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Abstract

We propose a new scheme to realize a multistage optical Stark deceleration for a supersonic molecular beam using a time-varying red-detuned quasi-cw optical lattice with a length of up to 10mm. We analyze the motion of the slowed molecules inside the optical decelerator, and study the dependences of the velocity of the slowed molecular packet on the synchronous phase angle and the number of the deceleration stages (i.e., the number of the optical-lattice cells) by using Monte-Carlo method. Our study shows that the proposed optical Stark decelerator cannot only efficiently slow a pulsed supersonic beam from 230m/s to zero (standstill), but also obtain an ultracold molecular packet with a temperature of sub-mK due to bunching effect in the multistage optical Stark decelerator, which can be trapped in the optical lattice by rapidly turning off the modulation signal of the lattice. Also, we compare the decelerated results of our multistage optical Stark decelerator with a single-stage optical one, and find that our scheme cannot only obtain a colder molecular packet under the same molecular-beam parameters and deceleration conditions, but also be directly used to trap the slowed cold molecules after the deceleration, while don’t need to use another molecular trap.

Simulated time-of-flight signal of CH4 molecules at the outlet of the decelerator for the synchronous phase angle ϕ0=900 and different deceleration stage n, and other simulation parameters are given in the text.

Simulated time-of-flight signal of CH4 molecules at the outlet of the decelerator for the deceleration stage n=7000 and different synchronous phase angle, and other simulation parameters are given in the text.

Simulated velocity distribution of slowed cold methane molecules trapped in the cw optical lattice for the synchronous phase angle (a) ϕ0=900, (b) ϕ0=1200 and (c) ϕ0=1500. The solid circles are the Monte-Carlo simulated results while the red lines are the Gaussian-fitted lines. The inset figure is the magnified Fig. 6(c).